


To Mend Through Speech or To Mend Through Actions

by JoyOcean



Category: Code Geass
Genre: Alternate Universe - Reincarnation, Can i even write relationships? probably not, Canon Compliant, Canon-Typical Violence, Drama, Eventual Romance, Fix-It, Fix-It of Sorts, Friendship, I'll update tags as I go, I'm planning on adding c.c. into the ship but we'll see if I make it that far, M/M, Maybe - Freeform, Other Additional Tags to Be Added, Post-Canon, Post-Canon Fix-It, Reincarnation, Tags Are Hard, for now, look I'm just randomly writing this, oh right this is a, other characters will show up later i promise, probably
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-02-27
Updated: 2020-03-01
Packaged: 2021-02-28 04:28:09
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 2,487
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22917730
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/JoyOcean/pseuds/JoyOcean
Summary: The Zero Requiem was successful. Emperess Nunnally lived long and her reign was prosperous. Peace was maintained for a century after her brother passed on.But Suzaku and C.C. had made a pact following the Requiem, full of regrets and loss, and C.C. bids her time through the years until she can fulfill her end of the deal. When a young reborn Suzaku, with no memories of his past life, is made Zero and a new emperor arises, it seems the time has come for C.C. to make her move.
Relationships: C.C. & Lelouch Lamperouge | Lelouch vi Britannia, Kururugi Suzaku & Lelouch Lamperouge | Lelouch vi Britannia, Kururugi Suzaku/Lelouch Lamperouge | Lelouch vi Britannia
Comments: 20
Kudos: 40





	1. Prologue

**Author's Note:**

> I literally wrote five pages (like, physical pages, I don't type my first drafts) in one day today based on this random idea, and the last time I got on a writing streak out of the blue like this I wrote like 40 pages in a week, so I'm hopeful that this will turn out the same. I'm going to be honest though, this is my first time posting, and it's mostly a test run. I'm definitely planning on going back and rewriting and correcting most of this.  
> I'll hopefully post the second chapter in like a day or two. I have more stuff written but it takes me a while to type and edit it. This first chapter isn't really edited since I wrote it on a whim, and it probably shows, but I'm hoping to work more on the second on before I post it.  
> 

The mask on his face kept him separate from the festivities. It was not bothersome--it was his duty, and he had grown used to the way people looked at the mask over the years. He was the peacekeeper; he was the guardian of the Britannian royal family. He was both more and less than a person, so long as he wore the mask.

The emperor glanced up from his wheelchair at him, at the figure of Zero that was a constant by the old ruler’s side. In terms of a life as long as the current emperor's, Suzaku’s time as Zero was fleeting. A blip on the radar only due to the importance of his position. Suzaku had no idea how many people had served the man in front of him over the years as Zero--even though he was Zero himself now, he was not privy to such information--but he knew the previous Zero had died in action. Whoever that person had been, they had served the emperor long and well. Every time the emperor looked at him, Suzaku could tell he mourned the previous Zero. Suzaku did not begrudge him for it. Only the current ruler ever knew the face under the mask, and Suzaku was glad someone mourned his unknown predecessor. Maybe someone would mourn him then when he passed in the line of duty.

“Come with me,” the emperor said to him. “I grow old, and I grow tired of such parties. We have more important matters to discuss.” Suzaku bowed his head and followed the old man as he wheeled out of the room.

They stopped inside an office lined wall to wall with shelves of record books. Suzaku had no idea who typically inhabited the office, and he was mildly concerned that the emperor had obtained access to the room without him noticing.

“Please allow me to check for surveillance devices before we continue,” he asked the emperor. The emperor scoffed as if such things were completely unnecessary but gave him the go-ahead. Suzaku pressed a button on the side of the Zero mask and inside, his view lit up with a scan of the room. Once he deemed the area secure he turned back to his majesty.

“Important times are ahead,” the emperor told him. Suzaku frowned beneath the mask. It was nothing he didn't already know, and it was strange to bring it up so suddenly. “I'm getting old, obviously, and--take off your mask, boy. It's just us here. I want to see your face when I'm having this conversation with you.”

Suzaku obediently unlatched the mask and removed it, setting it on the desk. “I ask that you please not address me as ‘boy’ when we are in such a setting, your majesty,” he said, hoping he didn't overstep his bounds.

“I know, I know,” the emperor huffed. “You must always appear as Zero and only Zero to the public, you're the embodiment of all past Zeros, yes, yes. I know.” He continued on. “Regardless, there's something I must discuss with you. 

“Succession,” Suzaku said. It was obvious, after how the emperor had mentioned his age.

“Yes.” The emperor nodded so hard Suzaku feared for his neck. “Who will rule Britannia next. My wife is dead. My son and my daughter have also passed on. My remaining son...he cannot take the throne, and he has no wish to rule.”

He paused for a moment and Suzaku deduced that the emperor was allowing him to add his own thoughts. “There are other branches of the family too,” Suzaku offered. “Cousins and such. They are not directly in the line of succession, but the nobility will accept them.”

The emperor nodded. “I have thought of that. There are some...one of my nieces would likely be an excellent ruler. But there's someone else I have in mind.” He rolled his wheelchair over to the window despite the fact it was too dark to see outside. “Have you met my daughter’s son?”

Suzaku wracked his brain. He met so many nobles that the members of the royal family were sometimes difficult to recall, but there was one... “The one named after the demon emperor?”

The emperor laughed at that. “Yes, that one. Do show him a little bit more respect though. He is in the direct line of succession, and it's not his fault his mother had such a strange sense of humor.”

“I've never been introduced to him properly,” Suzaku said. After all, “Zero” had known the prince since he was a baby. It would have been too obvious to need an official introduction after Suzaku stepped into the role. “But I've seen him at parties and at meetings.” The prince, despite his age, was highly involved with politics; almost everyone agreed that he was a genius at such things.

“I believe he would be an excellent successor.”

Suzaku raised an eyebrow. It wasn't his place to question the decision, but… “Isn't he rather young?”

“He’s the same age as you,” the emperor pointed out. “Like you, he has been raised to fit such a role. His mind is perfect for the job, and his bloodline is as direct as possible. It's true that some will question his youth, but he will succeed regardless.”

“I understand, your majesty.”

“I doubt you do," the old man chuckled, "but you will when the time comes. At that time, you will obey him as you obey me now. You will be Zero, his guardian. You will keep him in line, and you will keep the world in line behind him.”

Suzaku bowed his head. “Yes, your majesty.” The words seemed to echo inside of him.


	2. An Unfortunate Meeting

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Suzaku meets Prince Lelouch properly in the middle of bad decisions.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I really think Gino would call Lelouch Lulu if he was on his side.

It was only three months later that the emperor passed away. He was old, Suzaku supposed, and there was only so long he could hold onto life, even for the sake of his country. The nation mourned for him; he had been a good man, and he held the world with peaceful hands. 

Few were braced to expect anything but gentleness from the one he had chosen as a successor. From the perspective of Zero, Suzaku wondered if more should look to the future with apprehension; however, perhaps the royal family was right to project an air of confidence in such trying times. It wouldn’t do to show the citizenry the chaos that Zero had to handle behind the scenes after the death of the emperor.

The royal family and various nobles had been informed of the emperor's decision of successor not long after Suzaku. The young prince who had been chosen had known as well, but he clearly hadn't expected it all to happen so soon. No one had. Suzaku had been planning to speak with the prince at some point, personally, in order to prepare him and instruct him as Zero. He had thought they had time before the emperor’s death. Time to plan for the new ruler of the nation. Now his first official meeting with the prince was to be only hours before the prince was to take the throne.

The creak of the door behind him alerted Suzaku to the prince’s entrance. Suzaku had been standing in a private room, pacing while he waited. He turned, half expected the prince to enter tentatively; for him to be unsure, afraid. 

Someone did enter tentatively, but it wasn’t the prince.

A servant bowed low before Suzaku. “Ze-Zero.” Unseen, under the mask, Suzaku’s eyes narrowed at the stammer. Whatever this servant heralded, it was not good news. “We’re terribly, terribly sorry, but it seems the prince has gone out…”

Suzaku did his best not to twitch and give away his sudden flash of rage. Zero must remain composed, he reminded himself. “Gone out? Where? The coronation is in mere hours! What will be the state of the nation if the next emperor doesn’t even show up to be crowned?”

The servant flinched. “I don’t know, sir. I really don’t know! But...surely the prince would not ignore his duties like that. I’m sure he’ll return in time for the ceremony, if only Zero would wait a few hours?”

“I need to speak to him!” Suzaku marched past the servant to the door. “Aren’t you all tracking him or something? Don’t tell me it’s so easy to simply lose the next ruler of the nation?”

The servant hurried down the hall after him, struggling to keep up. “I-I can try to contact the security team, sir, but the prince has been known to disable his trackers if he does not want to be found.”

“And no one thought to get better trackers, ones that he can’t disable?”

“I’m afraid not, sir.” The servant refrained from pointing out that the budget for new trackers would have to be approved, possibly by the prince himself, and so would have been a useless proposal anyway. “I’ll go...find the security team. I’ll send someone over if we find anything!” He ran off and away from Suzaku’s fearsome presence.

Suzaku could tell the servant found the possibility of the trackers being operational unlikely, but he decided to act as though he would soon have a destination. “Prepare a car,” he told a passing maid. “I'm going out.”

“So soon before the coronation, Zero?”

The fewer people who knew about the prince’s disappearance, the better. “Something has come up that needs my urgent attention. I will most certainly be back in time for the ceremony, however. Just make the preparations.”

“Of course, sir.” She hurried off.

Suzaku had nothing to do but to wait for the car and the report from the security team. It seemed every servant that passed by had to comment on how improper it was to leave right before the coronation, as though he was the one breaking protocol and not the prince he had to fetch. Suzaku felt his ire increase. Such disrespect!

At last, another servant hurried over with the news that they had located the prince. “Here,” he quickly handed Suzaku a locator device, looking as though he’d rather be anywhere else. “Just follow that and you’ll find him.”

Suzaku barely remembered his manners enough to thank the servant before he got in the car and sped off.

The locator led to a restaurant called the Black Knights. Just the name alone was displeasing to Suzaku. Was it an insult to the terrorist group turned police force, led by Zero himself, that had served the UFN before the death of the Demon Emperor, or was it a compliment to them? Either way, it was no place for the next emperor of the nation to be when he was supposed to be preparing for his own coronation.

Customers cleared out quickly when Zero entered. Although violence was rare in this day and age, it was still Zero’s job to handle it, so everyone expected violence to be dealt with when Zero appeared unannounced in public.

They might not be wrong to expect violence, Suzaku thought. It would just be Zero causing it instead of stopping it. At the prompting of the locator device, he tore back the curtain of a private room and found the next emperor sitting with a handful of kids from various noble families, all looking extremely drunk.

Upon closer inspection, the prince actually looked significantly soberer than the others, but that wasn’t enough to stop Suzaku’s wrath.

“Prince Lelouch!” he burst out. The prince glanced up lazily at him. Suzaku rounded on the other noble children; he could only think of them as children when they behaved so poorly, so irresponsibly. “All of you, out!”

All except for one stumbled out of the room and exited the restaurant. The one remaining did his best to speak despite how much he’d had to drink.

“Look, man, Zero, sorry about all this.” He hiccupped. “But don’t be mad at Lulu, I’m the one who dragged him here,” he explained, scratching a hand through his blonde hair.

Suzaku was debating whether he remembered this particular noble’s name, and whether he was willing to use the name he thought he remembered to command the kid to leave, when Prince Lelouch said, “Just get out, Gino. It’s not your responsibility to take care of me, it’s Zero’s.”

Gino--Weinburg, Suzaku believed his family name was--looked hesitant, but he raised a shaky hand in a wave. “Guess I’ll see you at the coronation then, ‘kay Lulu?” He closed the curtain quietly as he left.

Suzaku addressed Prince Lelouch again. “Your highness, what, if I may ask, do you think you’re doing? Your coronation is in,” his eyes slide down to the clock display inside his mask, “three hours. Why are you not busy getting ready?”

“Why aren’t you?” the prince returned, his drunken state showing through. Suzaku felt his fists clench under his cape. “Anyway, you’re just angry because I skipped a meeting with the great Zero and all, right?”

“I’m angry because the emperor, leader of this nation, has passed, and you, his chosen successor, are supposed to be at the ceremony, getting crowned for the good of the nation, in only three hours! I’m angry,” he leaned in, hands braced on the table, “because instead of reassuring your people, you’re here getting drunk.”

“You should join me,” the prince said with a smirk. “You could do with letting go for a bit, for once.”

Suzaku straightened. “Get up,” he told him sourly. “We’re going back to the palace.”

Prince Lelouch glared down at the table. “Right. I have to go get crowned ‘for the good of the nation.’” He drained whatever was in his glass in one go before he practically erupted with shouted words. “What about what’ good for me, huh? What about what I want? I-”

“Do you not want to be the emperor?” Suzaku interrupted him to ask.

“What?” Prince Lelouch blinked at him.

“If you don’t want to be the emperor, tell me right now and I’ll go find another candidate before the coronation. It won’t be your problem anymore.”

“And I won’t be your problem anymore,” Prince Lelouch mused. Suzaku couldn’t tell if he was debating it or not under his twisted smile. Then he spoke again. “No, that’s not what I want. I am willing to follow my grandfather’s wishes and become the emperor as he wanted. I just…” he looked lost.

“What?” Suzaku asked unsympathetically.

“I wish he didn’t have to die. Why did he have to die?” Tears started rolling down the prince’s cheeks. “He wasn’t that old. He could have lived a little longer…”

Suzaku only stared for a moment before he gently laid a hand on Prince Lelouch’s shoulder. “Let’s go back to the palace, yes? It’s...it's what your grandfather would have wanted.”

Prince Lelouch let Suzaku led him back to the car as he wiped tears from his face.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> OK, so my reasoning for all this is that Lelouch always reacts REALLY terribly to the deaths of people he loves. He becomes super vengeful as well, but his behavior during these events tends to be more self-destructive than anything? Getting exiled, the thing with Refrain, being unable to stop the Black Knights from turning against him...etc. And in this case, the previous emperor raised him, so they were quite close. Since his death was due to old age, there's nothing for Lelouch to get revenge against, and this Lelouch is slightly (only slightly) mentally healthier, so he gets sad instead. It's hard to write "Prince Lelouch" every time instead of just "Lelouch", but technically the story is from Suzaku's perspective rn, and he's very stiff when it comes to manners at this time...  
> Also, some people write Suzaku as very passive, which I guess he was a bit by the end...but this Suzaku is more like he was earlier in the show, with his beginning-of-the-show optimism and bits of the temper that he shows later.  
> Gino was a good (maybe?) influence on Suzaku in canon, but apparently his reborn self's influence on Lelouch isn't as commendable.
> 
> If you're wondering why they don't have any feelings of recognizing each other at all, it's because Suzaku still has his mask on. The show places a really large emphasis on eye contact, bc of Lelouch's geass obviously, but I wanted to continue that by having them need face-to-face conversations to actually get any sort of flashes from the past. Suzaku is getting a little bit of that feeling from seeing Lelouch, bc he can see Lelouch's face, but he's only seeing him through the mask and he's also seen Lelouch before in passing, as previously mentioned, so he's brushing it off as just remembering those brief meetings. Therefore it's not enough to be commented on in the story.
> 
> Thank you for the comments and support! I was planning to get this chapter out earlier, but I didn't like my original idea for their first meeting, so I scrapped it and started over a few times. I hope it's acceptable. It's a bit of a dialogue-heavy chapter, but it's also longer...Does it read well? What are your thoughts on how it turned out?  
> I'm definitely planning on continuing this, but it may be a while before I get another chapter out, because changing their meeting means I have to change everything else I wrote for what comes after...oops. I also want to start writing a few other Code Geass fics, so hopefully those will also be interesting.

**Author's Note:**

> Any comments on whether you like this, ideas for cool stuff that could happen...literally any comments would be great. If your comment is that the dialogue is stiff, I already know and that's one of the main things I want to go back and fix, but like, I'd love to hear about whatever else.


End file.
